It was such a pleasant morning yesterday that I just wanted to lay down and enjoy the sunrise.
Yet I also knew that in a few hours I’d be suffering from the intense heat.
It was 74F at 7:30am. Two hours later, at Chaco Canyon, a place of ancient Pueblo ruins that were south and further away from Farmington than I thought, it was 20 degrees warmer. Getting there was half the battle, as 17 miles of the road to this remote place were badly-rutted dirt roads.
The park is accessible only from USHwy550 from the east end.
Chaco Canyon is worth a visit for anyone wanting to learn about ancient Puebloan life, but it’s best explored under cooler climes. The canyon is wide, with a wash dividing the plain. Ruins fade with the fragile rock walls behind them. Cracked boulders sit precariously close to tumbling into the remaining ruins. Sagebrush, Mormon tea and dry grasses dot the landscape, but little wildlife calls this place home. A deep but narrow wash in the valley was dry.
Although the rangers at the Visitor’s Center were very helpful about recommending hikes (Pueblo Alto was the most popular), the South Mesa trail was remote and offered solitude, according to Rose, the Native American working behind the counter.
Ruins and petroglyphs were all over the canyon.
I filled up the water bottles and drove off to the trailhead at the end of the park’s loop drive. I passed at least three impressive ruins along the sandstone cliffs, ancient villages that were inhabitable 1000 AD. Some of the ruins bordered cliffs that had tumbled down on the ruins. Others showed signs of having had multiple stories.
We had to climb up and scramble up a slot passageway, the only shaded part of the entire hike, to get to the clifftops.
Sadie was clearly hot by the time we started. She sought the shade, what little there was, and pulled on her leash to get to it.
Views from the top were worth the climb, but it was also hot and offered little shade. I opted to cut this 4-mile loop hike short and made it a two-miler, after having to stop twice for Sadie to cool off under the shadow of a small cliff, to let her rest and have water.
This two-mile hike took an hour, and by noon we were back at the van. I was now ready to leave the park and move on to more altitude just to make sure Sadie stayed cool. She deserved that.
Chaco Canyon is on the Navajo Reservation, and as soon as I had crossed from the National Park property to the reservation, the road became rutted. Red dust covered my van; I had to use my rear wiper blades to get rid of the added dust. The air conditioner was on high to cool Sadie off, who seemed to have suffered worse from the heat than expected. She lay her head as close to me as she could, to enjoy some of the cool air blowing toward her from the van's air conditoner.
The vibrations of the rutted road caused the screws in my head to rattle profusely. What made it worse was that there were no directional signs to indicate on what road I was on. Where in the hell was I going? Worse yet, I had no decent map of the local area outside of the Navajo Nation. The van swerved in the loose sand, the axle rattled and the noise was enough to drive anyone insane. I couldn’t wait to get back to civilization again.
I felt like I was on the “road to nowhere” on this reservation, passing White Horse, a town of one horse and nothing else, and then Borrego Pass, a small community with an elementary school.
Sadie deserved to enjoy this road trip as well. According to my map, the Cibola National Forest wasn’t too far away, but all the roads were badly-rutted, unmarked dirt roads. It took me two hours to come to a town again after passing dirty trailers, abandoned pick-ups and scattered beer cans—the first ones on my entire roadtrip—and other forms of life.
I eventually made it to the small town of Milan, off I-40, and then the larger town of Grants, NM, a few miles east of Milan and an hour west of Albuquerque.
Hiking up Mount Taylor was a pleasant surprise. NM547 heads from the town center up into the national forest, and this is where I went, after a brief stop at the Ranger Station for trailhead information. I found the perfect trail up Mount Taylor: the 6-mile hike up the Gooseberry Springs trail.
Could I make this hike still today? It was 4:35pm when I got to the trailhead parking lot. The peak looked easy, a wide meadow of a round hill with few trees. Aspens adorned the parking lot, sprinkled with Douglas firs. Indian paintbrush, lupines, fleabanes and yarrow dotted the ground. And the rock all around was lavaic, providing for added traction on the way (but which could give someone a serious butt burn after a fall!)
The trail up Mount Taylor is lush green with an easy grade. OK, I thought, I am tired and dusty and it’s already 4:45pm. I’ll go up this trail until 6pm and then go back down. I could always finish this trail first thing in the morning.
My left sandal had been pulled under the heel to provide less friction for my still-heeling blister. I wasn’t going to put on my hiking boots, so I went as is.
Sadie seemed fine up this hike, although she stayed so close to me her wet nose would hit the back of my shins. Was she exhausted from the morning's venture or was she just being cautious in this strange terrain? I did worry about big wildlife, but with no water around there was little chance of coming across deer, mountain lions or black bears.
She didn’t venture far, even when, at over 10,000 feet, we came across grazing cows at a high meadow. A lone bull had been guarding the trail further away, keeping an eye on Sadie. They were the only fauna we came across. Not even birds flew overhead.
It was an easy summit, despite the elevation. Skies above us were overcast, with a few grey clouds nearby. But despite the altitude and lack of trees, there was little wind when we finally made it to the peak at 6:17pm, 92 minutes after starting out. Haze prohibited me from seeing far into the distance, even the mountains in Colorado were muted. On a clear day I’m sure the vista would have been spectacular.
A small silver memorial plaque had been laid down below the sign, in honor of a person who probably loved to hike peaks: “If tears could build bridges I’d climb up to heaven to bring you back down to me.”
We stayed at the peak for ten minutes. A sign with “Mount Taylor, Elevation 11301” allowed for a few photo ops, and then we went down the trail. Sadie never left my side.
The cows we met at the high meadow were still chewing their cud on our way down, and again Sadie made intimate contact with them. Neither was in any mood to put up with her. But the black bull we saw had moved down to the forest road.
We were back at the van at 7:45pm, three hours after we had started this hike.
I had now completed my goal of bagging a 10,000’ peak. Mount Taylor was an easy peak for its altitude, rising moderately on long switchbacks. Although the Forest Service described this hike as “Strenuous due to the 2000’ elevation gain,” I had no trouble. Had I gotten myself into shape this past month, hiking most every day during my roadtrip?
I wanted to celebrate my accomplishment. Granted, bagging a 10,000-footer in Montana would have been nicer, or even to have made it up Mount Timpanogos, but for now I will be happy to have bagged Mt Taylor with Sadie, who never left my side.
I wanted to celebrate with a hearty meal and a few margaritas in town, but after driving up and down the main drag never came across a decent Mexican restaurant.
I settled for two cheap Taco Bell burritos and two beers that I picked up at WalMart. I must have been a scary sight on the surveillance tape, wandering around the store looking for beer, sausage bites (treats for Sadie) and a New Mexico map. My legs were dirty from the hike, my hair hadn’t been washed since yesterday afternoon, and my shorts were stained from rocks along the way.
And, for the first time on my roadtrip, I was ready to rent a hotel room. I had deserved it and so had Sadie.
Finding a decent motel room proved disappointing. My first choice was a locally-owned “Historic Route 66 Motel." The front marquee advertised “Cheapest Price in town.
But when I got to the front desk the stale smell of cigarettes and paint hit my nostrils. I knew then that I had made a bad decision.
“How much are your rooms?”
“Just for the night?”
“Yes.”
“$80.”
“$80?! Why so high?”
“There’s a bike rally in town and you’re not going to find a room cheaper than that!” said the brown-toothed woman behind the counter. A cigarette-smelling, oil-stained older man nearby agreed with her.
“Motel 6 was advertising $39 a room, and others for $49”
“Not today, with the bike rally in town. Did you not see all the bikes in the down town area?”
“There’s a downtown in this town?”
I didn’t notice a rally in town, although I did see Harley riders in town. In the Southwest in the summer, though, Harley riders take over small towns; their presence is ubiquitous.
I wasn’t going to give up. I went back to the Motel 6 and got a room for $45 a night. What a relief!
Then I went across the highway to get some sodas and snacks from the SuperWalmart, where I've seen the largest and most morbidly-obese Hispanics and Native Americans I've seen anywhere, even Houston. What is causing all this in such a small region?
I lured Sadie into the room who at first was apprehensive of being inside a room again, but inside she went, hopped on the bed, and slept the rest of the night next to me while I enjoyed flipping the cable channels, watching the weather channel, parts of late night comedy shows, Patch Adams and the never-ending saga of Michael Jackson’s death and now the disclosure that he had been on Demerol since his 1984 hair burning incident during a Pepsi commercial. Sadie and I bonded on this time and I fell in love with her all over again.
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